My sister Eveline gave it to her young
cousin, to whom she engaged herself. But afterwards, when she went to
live with a gay and heartless aunt of mine, she broke her promise to him
for the sake of a richer match. The day that she was married, our cousin
far away saw the black letters turn red upon the signet-ring."
"Oh, Miss Agnes!" I exclaimed.
"And why should not letters change?" she asked, abruptly; and I saw her
eyes look out dreamily, as if at something I did not see. "The letter
clothes the spirit; and the spirit gives life to the form. A face grows
lovely or unlovely with the spirit that lies behind it. I cannot say if
there be a spirit in such things. Yet what we have worn we give a value
to. It has an expression in our eyes. Do we give it all that expression,
or has it some life of its own?"
She interrupted herself, and went on:--
"I had known that Ernest was not true to me. I had known it by the words
he wrote to me. They did not have the ring of pure silver; there was a
clang to them. When Fanny read aloud the loss of that ring, it spoke to
a suspicion that was lying in the depth of my heart, and roused it into
life.
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